


The Most Delicate Art

by dream56



Category: Original Work
Genre: Casual Magic, Demon, Fairy, Fantasy, It's a sass-fest all around basically, It's a soft narrative made of dialogue, M/M, Magic, OCs Belong to BaphometBimbo, Slice of Life, and there's a lot of horny flirting if that wasn't obvious
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-31
Updated: 2020-01-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:33:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22488733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dream56/pseuds/dream56
Summary: Prin busies around his shop, hunting potion ingredients. Why hadn't he taken a job that let him sit around all day and rake in the gold? Demon boyfriend or not, he needed to rethink his business strategy.
Relationships: Prin/Bruce (BaphometBimbo)
Kudos: 4





	The Most Delicate Art

Prin dawdled through the air, opening one small drawer then another. He hummed through words as he searched through the wall-sized apothecary cabinet that extended far higher than the exterior of his humble shop suggested. The tune he threaded the words along was a minor, pleasant ditty he’d picked out this morning in the bath.

“In _fus_ ions…Willow Bark…Wisteria, _Scor_ ched and _Un_ scorched…” He beat his translucent wings once and flew up a level, picking his way in the opposite direction. “Well moss, weeping grass, wasp nest…”

Prin puzzled a bit before brightening, floating lazily downwards toward a particular drawer. He drew it out, but gave a cry of disgust. He pulled the drawer further out, peeked into the back, stuck his arm inside and felt around before giving a dejected sigh, arm still deep in the drawer.

“Always, _always_ , _some_ thing. Why is it _always_ you though? I should make sure to overstock the next time Bruce—“

The crystal bells above his shop door tinkled and Prin’s downcast annoyance transformed to glee. With an agile swoop, he flew directly in front of his guest, hovering eye level with him, settling his hands on those wide, strong shoulders.

Bruce grinned, “Bad time?”

Prin smooched his face then lowered himself to the ground, still grasping Bruce’s shoulders. “ _Perfect_ time. I was _just_ needing your expertise.”

“Well lucky for you, I haven’t had a good nut in a few days.”

“ _No_ , not _that_ ,” Prin said, smacking Bruce’s stomach. “Not _yet_ anyway. I mean something for the shop.”

“Let me guess,” Bruce said, shluffing off an enormous backpack which he proceeded to dig around in. He retrieved a gnarly looking knobby root and waved it in front of Prin’s sparkling eyes. “Mandragora?”

Prin snatched it, shaking his hips happily. “ _Ah_ , if I didn’t know you any better, I’d say you were _psychic_.”

“You’d also say I like listening in at open windows,” Bruce smirked, jerking a clawed thumb in the direction of a cottage window venting steam from a rapidly boiling cauldron in the corner.

“ _Cheater_ ,” Prin said, hopping up and smooching Bruce’s face again. “I _would_ have said an _educated_ guess.”

“Is that wrong?” Bruce chuckled, the dark sooty notes of his laughter adding a complimentary cheer to the bright buoyancy of the shop. He trotted toward a waiting sofa and plopped down, spreading his legs. Bruce was hilariously too big for this delicate piece of furniture and Prin stretched a worried frown as he heard creaking. He was glad he magically reinforced that one after what had happened to the loveseat.

“Whaddya want mandrake for, anyway?” Bruce asked, sniffing the errant drafts from the cauldron, then rubbing his nose. “Isn’t usually what’s in aphrodisiacs, is it?”

“ _No_ ,” Prin said, pursing his lips. He looked over the human-shaped lump of earthy matter, its fibrous outer husk still intact. He snapped off a leg and flew up to ensconce the rest in its proper drawer.

Bruce spread his arms over the top of the sofa, considering. “Disguise then? Roleplay? Don’t tell me somebody wanted you to make em as big as a house again.”

“A _human_ ,” Prin said, rejoining Bruce at floor level and busily shaving the knob of mandrake with a paring knife. “A _human_ came into the shop yesterday.”

“Ah,” Bruce said, “penis enlargement, then.”

Prin snorted. “I wish. Half a teaspoon of mensing powder in a cup of cardacum tea. Glad _that_ recipe is a trade secret. I paid for my bathroom retiling on dick jobs alone.”

“I thought dick jobs were for pleasure, not for work,” Bruce said, a rumble of laughter in his gut.

“ _Both,”_ Prin said, “I’m an enterprising fairy.”

“So not a dick job this time. What else do humans want?”

Prin whittled harder, nearly slicing right through the long paper thin sheet he’d carved from around and around the diminishing knob. “He asked me for a love potion.”

Bruce whistled. “Poor bastard.”

“Came _right_ in here and said, _Oh aren’t you the one who helps people in love?_ Same pathetic, star-struck look in his eyes like they all have. And I said, that depends. _My_ métier lies in parties navigating bedroom issues. Is there anything I can help you with there? _Oh no,_ he said, _I heard somebody say you do love potions_.”

“You’re a regular homewrecker,” Bruce said, chortling.

Prin scrunched his face up, walking over and dunking the completed sheet of mandrake into the cauldron, the frothing fluid inside shifting from purple to blue, another dunk, then from blue to lighter blue. Satisfied, Prin dropped the full sheet inside. The color remained the same.

“Glad you got fresh. Where’d you have to dig? Gallows Ravine?”

“That’d be _my_ trade secret,” Bruce said, finger-gunning.

Prin rolled his eyes. “I bet you have a big garden somewhere. Nice big field with plenty of poplar bees and cinnamon poppies. And you wear a big floppy sunhat.”

“Hard to find hats that big, let me tell you,” Bruce said. The couch beneath him creaked. “Or that fit the horns. And so? You’re going through with it, I see.”

“I’m only giving him what he wants. Or what he _says_ he wants. Leaned over the counter and said, _I’m in love but I don’t want to be,_ told him time would work better than anything I could offer him, _no no_ , he said, _I have to have something else, I can’t bear it_.”

“Humans don’t stick around as long as other races, Prin,” Bruce said. “Makes em more fun to fuck since they come at you with this _intensity_.”

“Candle burning at both ends, I know,” Prin said. “A few evenings ago, a man from a couple towns over brought some mead and we had a _wonderful_ time. Showed up at dusk, set out mid-morning next day.”

“Bet he came in your backdoor,” Bruce snorted.

“That’s a _private_ door,” Prin said. “If I had people tromping around with muddy boots back there, I’d never get anything done. Besides, I get enough interest from the _front_.”

“Don’t have to tell me,” Bruce said. “I wanna squeeze you all over right now.”

Prin half-stepped over toward his visitor but looked back at the cauldron.

“What’d he want the potion for anyway?” Bruce asked.

“He _says_ he wants out, to fall _out_ of love with his lover whose _wife_ doesn’t know about their goings-on. What I _expect_ he’ll do is spike the poor asshole’s drink thinking he’ll serve a tidy divorce and then the two of them can spend their happily ever hour together before something else comes up.”

Bruce grunted, leaning forward. “He’ll be out more than the tonic then. He’ll need something strong to mask that taste.”

“I’m giving him _exactly_ what he asked for,” Prin said stiffly. “If that’s what he’s planning, it won’t work. Why do you think I ask for blood?” He drew a tiny vial from his shirt pocket and unstoppered it, tipping a single fat drop of blood into the bubbling basin. Instantly the foam climbed higher, the hue sharply shifting from blue to purple again, then to red, a deep, earthy red, far removed from the luscious luster of a seductive apple or autumn sunset.

Bruce wrinkled his nose. The wafts of vapor stung as they neared him. He shuffled to his feet and opened another window.

“Anybody else drinks this,” Prin continued, “It’s as good as bitter water.” He gathered a small heap of ingredients from the counter and began plopping them into the pot, each addition tempering the color only slightly, some producing loud hisses, others prolonged gurgles as they broke down and incorporated into the mixture.

Bruce remained silent, fanning himself.

A final sprinkle of yellow dust and the liquid lurched, as if avoiding the component entirely. As it melded with the contents of the cauldron, the bubbles all disappeared and the fluid relaxed, now a cherry red and shimmering, thin but inert. Prin moved the small cauldron away from the pit of dull blue fairy fire underneath it.

“That it, then?” Bruce asked.

“That’s it,” Prin said. “ _Happiness_ in a bottle.”

Bruce frowned then drew closer to the counter where Prin had retreated, slumping onto his stool. “Why not refuse him if it makes you so glum? I’d have socked him for good measure.”

“Because _humans don’t know what they want!_ First this, then that. They believe they can do anything until the least little thing gets in their way. Then they run off to find magic solutions to mundane problems.”

“I think exaggeration is a racial trait among them,” Bruce said.

“They can’t see _cost!_ ” Prin thumped his fist down on the counter, upsetting a small vase of quills. He rubbed his hand. Bruce replaced the pens in their receptacle.

“They pay you well enough, don’t they? Once I had an elf try to haggle me down to pennies and I told him where he could put his coin-purse.”

Prin sank lower until he rested his chin on folded arms. “Humans don’t see the complete picture. They see their desires, _if_ they own up to them at all, and the actions needed to achieve them. It’s a rare human that sees _consequence_.”

“They should play more board games. It’d give them practice in weighing their choices,” Bruce said. He put a large hand on Prin’s head, sliding it tenderly down his face. “Come on now, what’re you actually bummed about?”

Prin took a second, then pressed Bruce’s hand harder to his cheek, all stress melting from his visage. “…I missed you,” he murmured.

“Even with that mead man from two towns over?” Bruce smirked.

Prin perked up. “ _Listen_ , he was _fantastic_. You should have _seen_ the angle on his cock, _just_ curved enough to really pinpoint the best spots.”

Bruce nodded. “Drank with a Halfling last week. She had the perfect size waist for me to pick her up and go to town. Busty too. Think she ended up drinking more cum than booze.” He let out a loud laugh that rattled the shop and Prin smiled.

“Anyway,” Bruce said, “thought I’d stretch out upstairs for a bit before making dinner. Caught some river puddlers I wanna grill up.”

Prin grimaced.

Bruce grinned. “And gathered some poshberries from a garner grove. I’ll make you some turnovers. But first, I wanna rest up. Those last miles of road need some work.”

“Go,” Prin got up and shoved Bruce toward an old intricate curtain covering an open entryway near the back of the shop. “Go lie down. I want you full of energy for when I have _my_ dinner later. It sounded like that Halfling and I have similar tastes.”

“Oh, I’m _full_ up in that department,” Bruce said, tugging the crotch of his pants. He reached out and circled Prin with one arm, pulling him in, slipping one hand down to squeeze Prin’s ass, his claws making little headway against Prin’s magically reinforced work slacks. Prin had learned his lesson from the last time.

Prin leaned in, rubbed his face against the loose covering of Bruce’s shirt. The fabric was hardly soft, but was suffused with scent; a roil of rust, pine needles, fresh pitted fruits, musty cellars, burnished sun-sparkle, and new, pungent musk came tumbling from Bruce’s chest into his nose, spreading across his senses in a blanket of comforting, arousing aroma. Prin leaned in, feet just lifting off the ground as Bruce’s hand tucked itself under his butt, supporting him.

“Why don’t we…” Bruce said.

Prin had closed his eyes and waved one hand behind him. A gust of wind blew through the fairy fire, snuffing it without smoke. A second gust broke off from the first, sweeping over and flipping the **Open** sign onto its reverse. Bruce parted the curtain and passed through, its red and blue and pink folds falling back in ripples behind him.

**Author's Note:**

> OCs Belong to BaphometBimbo.


End file.
